Music Festivals

[DoubleK]

Did anyone go to Shambhala?

Was the first one for me and is quite the experience if you haven't been before.

Very impressed with the quality of the stages and sound systems.

I was particularly blown away by Protohype. Not normally a dubstep guy, but have not heard someone destroy a crowd like that in a very long time.

Andy C & Armani Reign killed it on Saturday. Those guys need to come to Calgary more frequently than they do.

See below for Datsik's opening track... Special Sham edit!!

[Matata]

Originally Posted by DoubleK

Did anyone go to Shambhala?

Was the first one for me and is quite the experience if you haven't been before.

Very impressed with the quality of the stages and sound systems.

I was particularly blown away by Protohype. Not normally a dubstep guy, but have not heard someone destroy a crowd like that in a very long time.

Andy C & Armani Reign killed it on Saturday. Those guys need to come to Calgary more frequently than they do.

See below for Datsik's opening track... Special Sham edit!!

I've been to 3 Shambhala's as of this year, and they are easily the best thing that happens in western Canada (imo of course).

At a typical music festival, people are generally there to consume the festival: they expect to be entertained, for someone to pick up after them, Beer gardens, etc. And many festivals create conditions that kill people in order to keep alcohol sponsors happy.

At Shambhala, the majority of the people are there as participants: the crowd is often more entertaining to look at than the stages, no corporate sponsorship, people offer gifts to strangers, people set up attractions in their camp (my camp had a geodesic dome with an aerial hoop and hammocks) and there is a general sense that people are looking out for and supporting one another. People leave with a improved sense of well being in both themselves and the world they live in. Shambhala is somewhere between a traditional music festival and Burning Man, it's hard to find anything that you can directly compare it to.

My favorite sets this year were A Skillz, DJ Nu Mark, Mr Scruff, Mark Farina's Mushroom Jazz, Vespers, Moby and the Fractal Funk Jam.

[troutman]

I'm going to Denver!
http://denver.riotfest.org/?sort=day

[drew24]

Originally Posted by troutman

I'm going to Denver!

Nice! Sounds like CP has all 3 Riot Fests covered. I'm off to Boston tomorrow for Boston Calling and then off to Chicago for Riot Fest. Kind of dreading the Riot Fest schedule. Conflicts are bound to be pretty tough.

Spoiler!

[troutman]

Sunday in Chicago is awesome.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by drew24

Nice! Sounds like CP has all 3 Riot Fests covered. I'm off to Boston tomorrow for Boston Calling and then off to Chicago for Riot Fest. Kind of dreading the Riot Fest schedule. Conflicts are bound to be pretty tough.

Spoiler!

I will be at the Toronto one this weekend. Unfortunately, I was looking at the schedule just posted on the website and Thurston Moore has cancelled both Toronto and Chicago. Visa issues apparently (I don't understand what they could be though).

[drew24]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

I will be at the Toronto one this weekend. Unfortunately, I was looking at the schedule just posted on the website and Thurston Moore has cancelled both Toronto and Chicago. Visa issues apparently (I don't understand what they could be though).

Yeah that sucks. Was looking forward to his new band. Has Debbie Googe from My Bloody Valentine in it.

Have a blast this weekend!

[woob]

Originally Posted by troutman

I'm going to Denver!
http://denver.riotfest.org/?sort=day

Wow.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by drew24

Yeah that sucks. Was looking forward to his new band. Has Debbie Googe from My Bloody Valentine in it.

Have a blast this weekend!

It turned out to be a great festival. We had some serious rain on Friday night, so the grounds were really muddy for Saturday. The crowd was generally good and the staff were really friendly. My wife and I got to the front for most of them.

Here is a brief rundown of bands that I saw and my impressions.

Awolnation - One of the more radio-friendly rock bands there. They were really good though. The sound was good and audience participation was fun. They seemed to really like being there.

The Flaming Lips - Stole the show again as they often do. How can anyone not have fun during a Flaming Lips concert.

Die Antwoord - Great show. Yolandi was cute as heck. Out of all the shows I saw though, this one had some bad seeds in the crowd. Lots of entitled spoiled kids.

The Cure - They were good, but following The Flaming Lips was tough. It was kind of hard to get into after that.

Clutch - Very tight. The crowd started small, but by the end of the show, they were drawing a lot of people in. Probably the loudest band there.

Metric - good as always. In fact, sound-wise, it might have been the best show of theirs that I have seen.

The Bots - I had no idea who these guys were beforehand, but they were worth checking out. They are a 2-piece drum and guitar punk/metal band. The singer was pretty funny and the drummer is fun to watch (he looks like he is like 12 years old though).

Death From Above 1979 - They were good, but man do they come off like dicks. Still, I would watch again.

The Afghan Whigs - Sound better than ever.

The Beaches - A young "Riot Grrl" type of group. They are a local Toronto group and probably won't be at the other shows. They had some pretty good hooks.

I caught a few others, but the above are the ones that stood out for me. Stars, The New Pornographers and Bob Mould were OK. Tokyo Police Club underwhelmed. The Drop Kick Murphys were OK, but personally I kind them repetitive.

[troutman]

The New Pornographers and Bob Mould were OK.

Watch your mouth

Have not seen The Cure before - looking forward to that, and of course, Bob Mould, TV On The Radio, The Flaming Lips ad Dum Dum Girls.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by troutman

The New Pornographers and Bob Mould were OK.

Watch your mouth

Have not seen The Cure before - looking forward to that, and of course, Bob Mould, TV On The Radio, The Flaming Lips ad Dum Dum Girls.

Don't get me wrong, Bob Mould sounded good. We didn't catch the whole thing due to a schedule conflict and were relegated to the perimeter. I didn't see enough to make a fair review.

The only regret is that we missed Mounties. They played early on the first day and getting in took longer than I though it would.

Stars also plugged Alvvays and played "Marry me, Archie". It's always nice when bands support other bands like that.

[drew24]

The Cure were my favorite. No Boys Don't Cry or The End of the World. And they played too long and didn't have enough time for an encore which frustrated the crowd. They didn't say goodbye or thanks so I think they wanted to come back on but aren't allowed because of curfew. Reading this I might sound disappointed but I wasn't. Running away my favorite from the weekend.

The Get Up Kids were my second favourite. I really like Something to Write Home About and they played it front to back. Crowd sang along for 90% of the set and we were having a blast.

Flaming Lips were good. I'm just way too annoyed by Wayne sometimes though. Was expecting to enjoy them a bit more. Probably should have seen the Descendants.

The National got there late so the set was 25 minutes short. They played a pretty boring setlist with only 1 song from each of Boxer and Alligator but they still sounded great.

This was my first time seeing Gwar and it was a lot of fun to watch.

The Hotelier and Pianos Become the Teeth were my favorite shows on Friday. The Hotelier set was full of mistakes but their new album is one of my favourites of the year.

Television was really cool to see. Pretty early show so the crowd wasn't what they deserved. They played a ton off of Marquee Moon. They sounded pretty great.

Hot Snakes, Afghan Whigs, Patti Smith, Hold Steady, Kurt Vile all met my expectations. All were good.

NOFX and Failure were disappointing.

Fun weekend. It was a bit too crowded but in general a very positive experience.

[troutman]

I finally got to see The Cure - 32 songs in 2.5 hours and they wanted to play longer, but the curfew came.

Set-list:

http://www.setlist.fm/setlist/the-cu...-63cf3647.html

[troutman]

[troutman]

[DOOM]

Tickets go on sale December 1st at 1 PM Mountain.

[troutman]

Ontario's New Bonnaroo-Affiliated Festival Reveals More Details

http://exclaim.ca/Music/article/onta...s_more_details

The event will be taking place from July 24 to 26 at Burl's Creek Event Grounds in Barrie, ON.

[corporatejay]

[DoubleK]

EDM lineup is meh.

Sunday lineup is pretty badass.

[troutman]